


Does The Leaf Turn Into Stone

by swordofsunrise



Category: Naruto
Genre: BAMF Tenten (Naruto), F/M, Fix-It of Sorts, Tenten (Naruto)-centric, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-01
Updated: 2020-08-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:14:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25653463
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/swordofsunrise/pseuds/swordofsunrise
Summary: "When you start low, you have to fight for every scrap of space you occupy in the world." Tenten ends up in Iwa instead of Konoha, with many curses standing at the tip of her tongue and a future criminal she must stop. Or kill. Now if she could just get her hands on some weapons... Time Travel!
Comments: 6
Kudos: 15





	Does The Leaf Turn Into Stone

**Author's Note:**

> Cross-posted to FF.net under swordofsunrise

_"I have this strange feeling, like I'm not myself anymore. It's hard to put into words, but I guess it's like I was fast asleep, and someone came, disassembled me, and hurriedly put me back together again. That sort of feeling." - Haruki Murakami_

* * *

Tenten blinked her eyes open and stared. Trees surrounded her and made for a pretty relaxing view, there were birds singing and the grass was soft enough for her body to melt into.

 _How nice,_ she thought in a daze.

The realization that there was something wrong didn't dawn on her until she caught sight of her hands. Except they weren't hers. They couldn't be, right?

Those skinny, tiny hands, void of bruises and cuts couldn't possibly belong to her. She had more body parts to fret over as she was bound to discover, though. Her legs were small, _weak._ They lacked the countless miles Gai-sensei had insisted that she run and walk. The curves of her seventeen-year-old self were no more, as if they had never even existed.

Tenten rose and marched towards the sparkling lake. She touched her face, tugging at her nose, her cheeks with the urgency of a madman. _Oh Kami, no, no, no..._ She glared at her younger self's reflection in the water, as if that would somehow be enough to make things right.

She rubbed her temples.

_This is a nightmare._

She grasped her kunai pouch and emptied it. There were no scrolls. No skillful projectiles. No sharp ninja wires. No poisoned senbon. No flashy katana. No explosive tags. No deadly shuriken.

_I'm in hell._

Her precious arsenal?

Gone. She had nothing left.

_Fuck me._

To say that she was pissed would be quite the understatement. Nobody messed with her weapons. She could forgive whatever sorry excuse of a ninja or hedonistic god had dared reduce her proportions to chipmunk-sized ones. _That_ she could have forgiven.

But to leave her defenseless and so, _so naked?_ She was a kunoichi and...

The anger that bubbled inside her came to a screeching halt. Tenten touched her forehead with a great deal of reluctance only for dread to fill her whole being.

She no longer had her hitai-ate.

Come to think of it, where was she anyways?

_I was fighting a war and there was Madara Uchiha and Neji just died and..._

It hit her like a ton of bricks.

She covered her mouth with her hands to muffle a sob, but her eyes betrayed her still. Her teammate was dead.

Neji was dead.

The others weren't safe either and she was stuck in some twisted version of reality, seven again and weaponless. Tenten did the only thing she felt like doing: she cried.

During the war, there wasn't any time reserved for mourning. She had to keep it inside, all that pain and anger and grief. If Lee wore his heart on his sleeve, she had to be his pollar opposite. Tenten couldn't allow herself to crumble and scream in despair. Not until the fighting was over.

Granted her current circumstances, she concluded that it was. For her, at least. The sound of two nearby voices had her standing still. She wiped at her eyes furiously, snorting in disbelief.

_Hold on a second...this forest doesn't belong to Konohagakure._

The meaning of the ninja headbands that had just entered her line of vision wasn't lost on her.

"Fuck." she cursed.

She was in _Iwa._

Why did Kami hate her so?

"Aren't you a little too young to be going around cursing like that?

_Of all places, why this one? Suna, I would have understood. I know Gaara and his siblings, never mind that they don't know me yet. Kumo...I would have hunted down whoever tried kidnapping Hinata as a child and killed the son of a bitch as justice for Neji's father. Kiri?_

_Tough, but I could have handled it._

_Why Iwa?_

"Fuck this."

Tenten clenched her fists, marching angrily into unknown territory and forgetting completely about the two shinobi.

"Oi, little lady with the foul mouth!" a voice called after her. The boy, who honestly wasn't that much older than her to be making comments.

She screamed right back.

"I'm not little!"

Except she was, embarrassingly so.

"Hai, hai, and I'm the Tsuchikage."

To think he had the audacity to laugh at her misfortune.

_That blue-eyed little shit..._

Tenten's hands itched to strangle something...or someone. She refused to be anyone's laughing stock.

"Knock it off, Deidara-nii." the dark-haired girl near him reprimanded.

Something in her brain clicked then.

_No....don't tell me._

"I'm sorry, what did you say your names are?" She had to be certain. There was no point in freaking out just yet.

_Plenty of time for that later._

"I'm Kurotsuchi, the Tsuchikage's niece. Kuro for short." she shoved a thumb in her friend's direction. "He is Deidara, my teammate."

Tenten looked between the two of them, feeling sick...and murderous. She couldn't seem to make up her mind. A chibi, future member of the Akatsuki was right there within reach.

And she had no sharp objects at her disposal.

Well, except for her hairpins but she didn't trust her aim, not until she got used to her current proportions, at least. Besides, she was seven-years-old and alone.

Those two were already genin and possibly three years older if she had to take a guess.

_Goddammit._

"The better question is...who are _you?"_ Deidara demanded. The intensity of his gaze could have left gaping holes inside her skull, had he possessed such power.

Luckily for her, he didn't.

"I'm Tenten." she paused, trying to think of a good story. "Tou-san was a merchant from Konoha."

_Always a safe thing to say._

Unlike ninja, merchants weren't grilled for information upon entering a shinobi village. Most trained eyes could pick out the killing machine in someone. Unless, of course, the person in question was one hell of a liar.

Which Tenten wasn't, but those were semantics. She would have to make do, channel her inner Neji.

The thought of him made her eyes sting. Not bad, considering the situation. If crying got her out of this mess, then she had no qualms about doing it.

"What do you mean 'was'? the girl titled her head to the side, suddenly angry. "What happened to him?"

The strangest thing occurred next. Deidara, the criminal, grasped his teammate's shoulder and gave a squeeze, blue eyes somber. "He died, Kuro...didn't he?" he looked at Tenten as he asked that.

"Yes. He was sick and our journey here made him tired." She focused on the war, on Neji and started crying with all the credibility of someone who just lost a person very dear to her heart.

Much to her surprise, the girl reached out and hugged her fiercerly.

"My kaa-san was sick, too. She died last spring."

Tenten didn't know what had possessed her to do it, but she returned the hug. Was it because she needed the comfort or had that piece of information touched her more than she'd like to admit?

"I'm sorry for your loss."

It sounded like the right thing to say, though she had no idea how losing a parent felt like. She didn't know hers. The loss of family she could understand, however.

Neji had been that to her. Team Gai was the only family she had ever known. They were the only people worth spilling tears over and the ones who'd hate seeing her cry.

"As I am sorry for yours." Kurotsuchi retorted as she pulled away.

It was Deidara who asked her about future plans. Kami knew Tenten didn't have any.

"Do you have a place to stay at?"

_Good question. Very good question._

"No. The inn I used to stay at just kicked me out." The time-traveller sobbed, making a show of burying her face in her hands.

Though granted her awful circumstances, it wasn't so much a show.

"You are coming to stay at my place." Kurotsuchi declared all of a sudden, her tone leaving no room for arguments.

Like the responsible shinobi she was, Tenten shook her head vehemently as she attempted to dry her tears.

"Thank you, but I can't do that." she sniffed into the sleeve of her blouse.

_For more reasons than one._

Kurotsuchi was the Tsuchikage's niece. A dangerous circle for her to get into. She'd attract way too much attention to herself.

Not that she had many alternatives. Leaving the village in her current state would be downright idiotic. She had no money and no physical poweress. How long would it take her to reach Konoha? A year? Two?

There was always the second option, just as risky, but longer. Significantly better, however.

If she joined the Ninja Academy there, pushed herself in order to graduate early, somehow landed a mission to Konoha and never returned...

_I'd be a missing-nin._

To use Shikamaru's catchphrase...

"Mendokse." Tenten whined as she let herself fall against the bark of a tree.

When Deidara had leaned over and poked her ribcage, her immediate reaction was an uppercut below his chin.

"Ow, fuck." he drew backwards. "You know how to punch." The awestruck expression on his face was worrying. He blinked. "Wait, how do you know that?" he asked, almost accusingly.

Tenten got in his face and flipped him the bird. Not her wisest decision, perhaps, but oh well, who knows when she'd get another chance to do it...without being brutally murdered, that is.

"Just like you do." she pushed herself to stand back on her feet. _"I learned."_

A hand sizing her wrist halted any potential movements.

It was Kurotsuchi.

"Wait, don't mind him. He was dropped on his head as a baby."

At that, Deidara loudly protested.

"Oi, why are you siding with the enemy?"

Tenten would have gone as far as to call the blond 'cute', if not for his despicable status.

The dark-haired girl rolled her eyes.

"I don't pick sides, you know that. The only side I pick is mine." she pushed her bangs out of her eyes. "If you are acting stupid, I tell you so. It's that simple. Now stop tormenting Tenten."

"She was the one who punched me!"

"You don't sneak up on girls, baka! You'd think that after me hitting you so many times, you would have gotten the memo."

Deidara crossed his arms over his chest, sulking.

Tenten did the mature thing and stuck out her tongue.

"She is the one who's provoking me!"

Kurotsuchi snorted. "We know each other from diapers and _y_ _ou_ have been provoking _me_ ever since so, shut it."

That caught her attention.

"Are you siblings?"

She had to ask.

"Kami, no." Kurotsuchi laughed. "Our parents had been part of the same genin team, best friends of sorts. Naturally, we were forced to spend time together." One of her eyebrows rose. "So, you are coming to stay with me, right?"

Tenten didn't miss the small blush adorning Deidara's cheeks even as Kuro did. She nodded in regards to her question, deciding not to tease him about it.

"Yes."

The word left a bitter taste inside her mouth.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



End file.
